Democratic Sentinel, Volume 14, Number 47, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 December 1890 — A Playful Rattlesnake. [ARTICLE]

A Playful Rattlesnake.

John A. Theroux, of Sprague, Cal., recently built a playhouse for his children, and for weeks the children have been telling their parents that there was a big snake in their playhouse, saying that when they were playing the snake would come out and run around the plavhouse and then run away again. Finally Mr. Theroux’s little son James came running to his mother, crying: “Come to the playhouse and see if I don’t know what a snake is.”

Mrs. Theroux went to see if there was anything there, and was greatly astonished to see a big rattlesnake calmly sunning itself on the floor in the doorway. She picked up a big bowlder and smashed his snakeship. When Mr. Theroux came home he went out and found the snake dead, and cut off his rattles, of which there were seven.— Pittsburg Dispatch.

The Board of Health have control of the railways, because they do the heaviest carrion trade.